February 27, 2020 

Defend your Flock from Poultry Disease: Know the Signs and How to 

Respond

 ** Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to 

facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the 

proceedings. **

>>> Hello, everyone, thank you for joining this webinar. We're excited to 

be celebrating Bird Health Awareness Week, part of the U.S.D.A.'s 

campaign, promoting the importance of biosecurity. We're here to support 

you and your flocks with expanded biosecurity resources. Practicing good 

biosecurity is the best way to keep flocks disease free. I'm Dr. Julie 

Gauthier, with the U.S.D.A., joined by Dr. Tahseen Aziz, and Dr. Michael 

Martin, from the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer 

Services. Before we start, we want to let you know that closed captions are 

available for this program. For anyone who wishes to view real time 

streaming captions, type the caption URL, www.bit.ly/Feb27-Webinar into 

your browser. The URL appears at the bottom of every slide so you can 

link to captions any time. The URL is case sensitive.

Now, we will introduce ourselves. I'm Dr. Julie Gauthier, and I'm the 

assistant director for poultry health, working for U.S.D.A. APHIS. I'm a 

veterinarian and I keep a small flock of poultry at home.

>> I'm Dr. Tahseen Aziz, a veterinary psychologist and diagnostician. I'm 

with the North Carolina Diagnostic Laboratory System and Department of 

Agriculture and Consumer Services.

>> Hi, I'm Mike Martin, director of poultry programs for the veterinary 

division at the North Carolina Department of Agriculture.
>> Thank you, Dr. Martin. Please feel free to submit questions by clicking 

the Q&A button at the bottom of the screen. We will answer your questions 

after the webinar has concluded. The Q&A will be posted with the 

recording of this webinar on the APHIS website. Be sure to follow the 

Defend Your Flock campaign on Facebook and Twitter to find out when the 

recording and Q&A are available. We will share those online destinations 

at the end of the webinar. 

We will start our presentation by talking about why prevention is so 

important, and usually much more successful than treatment, like the 

injection this sick hen is receiving. Preventable infectious diseases cause 

much suffering for poultry, all over the world. Flock keepers often contact

me asking for help, and often it's heart breaking for both of us because no 

treatment exists that will cure the problem, or it's too stressful for chickens 

to undergo treatment, or medication is too costly. I wish they contacted me 

earlier, about how to prevent the problem through biosecurity. Mike, I know 

you also had this conversation with people faced with sick flocks. Can you 

talk about why prevention is more effective?

>> Sure, we will talk a lot during this presentation about various diseases, 

and you will see that there are a fair number of diseases with no treatment, 

so these birds will get sick, exposed and may suffer while you're figuring 

out what to do, and there may be no treatment available, or it may be too 

late to treat them effectively or may not be cost effective. So when we look 

at this situation, prevention is key, from happening at all, mitigates 

everything so hopefully you don't have to go down the treatment path.

>> The step you take to stop the spread or introduction of harmful germs is 

biosecurity. A biosecurity plan is a combination of steps, and every flock is 

unique. So biosecurity is unique and customizable for your property, for 

the reason you keep the birds, climate and other things that make the 

flocks special. To be successful, biosecurity should be good habits, easy 

to do every day, every time. It should be practical, affordable, and focus on 

the big risks, such as bringing new birds home. When I talk to other small 

flock owners, they ask why they need a biosecurity plan if they only have a 

few chickens. I say, with a few simple habits, they can have a lot of control 
over the risks to their flock's health. My advice to small flock keepers is 

about the importance of practicing biosecurity.

>> Prevention is better than treatment. If you are doing disease 

prevention, the way to start is having a plan for biosecurity or a physical 

plan, either written or in your head, as far as how to control against risks of 

disease. For every flock, you will have a bit of individuality, each flock, 

each environment, is different. It's up to you to determine the most 

common, most likely risk factors for bringing bad bugs into the population. 

After that, it's looking at what ways to prevent the diseases from getting into 

the flock and determining what will be cost effective and time effective for 

you, and determining how to go about it, consistently, as far as practicing 

good biosecurity. So, it's an individualistic plan, but planning, nonetheless.

>> In the next part of the presentation, we will talk about poultry problems 

that biosecurity can prevent. They're grouped into three major categories. 

First, rare but highly contagious and deadly poultry diseases. Next, 

common and preventable diseases in the United States, and also, germs 

that don't make poultry sick but can be dangerous to people. Without 

biosecurity, the diseases that we will show are more likely to happen. By 

practicing biosecurity every day, every time, you may never see the 

problems we're about to describe. To know whether a disease is affecting 

your flock, you must know how to spot a sick chicken. We will help you 

identify sick birds. Tahseen, what are some warning signs? 

>> First, you should show the normal behavior and appearance of the 

birds. Healthy birds should be alert, active, have a normal appearance, 

and posture, should walk normally. The most common symptoms in sick 

birds include decreased activity, lethargy, not eating, anorexia, limping, leg 

weakness, abnormal posture, loose or bloody droppings, discoloration, or 

swelling of the comb, swelling of the eyelids, difficulty breathing, rasping 

breathing, ocular secretions, watery eyes, swelling of the joints, severe 

color loss, swollen head, thickening of the skin of the lower legs.

>> So the young chicken on the left and baby turkey on the right don't look 

like they're feeling well. Tahseen, could you describe the sign?
>> You're right. Certainly, these birds don't look healthy. They look 

lethargic, crouching, which means they're in hunchback posture. On the 

right, the turkey looks, ruffled feathers, droopy wings and eyes are closed. 

Definitely, these two birds are not healthy.

>> Sometimes poultry can act strangely or have an unusual appearance 

but they're not sick. What's going on with the hen in the left, Mike?

>> The bird on the left is exhibiting normal behavior for this chicken. It's a 

brooding hen. It's a chicken becoming a good mom, sitting on the eggs, 

keeping them nice and warm. People might think the bird is not active, not 

feeding and getting water as they used to, but it's normal. The one thing to 

watch out for, some can become more maternal, and may not get enough 

food or water for themselves. It's good to watch them and kick them off the 

nest once in a while. On the right, a, its skin has a normal pigmentation. 

People may think there's a skin disease or something wrong, that needs to 

be seen by a vet. That's not the case. One thing Tahseen talked about is 

knowing what is normal, to determine what's not normal. It's upright, 

responsive, so a lot of that goes to help you determine this bird is actually a 

normal bird. 

>> Now, details about some chicken diseases we hope you never 

encounter. These can be grouped into four syndromes, infections that can 

cause sudden death of most of the flocks, those that cause aggressive 

illness, affect the mouth and nose, infections that cause nervous system --

signs like Marek's disease. In the first category, these cause sudden death 

of many birds in a flock. These two stand out. Avian influenza, and virulent 

Newcastle disease. You may see them abbreviated as AI, and VND. We 

work hard to keep these out of United States. They cause suffering and 

death, and outbreak, it impacts the economy and jobs related to the poultry 

industry and the prices we all pay for eggs and other poultry products. If a 

number of birds die suddenly without explanation, this may be a design of 

one of those diseases and the keepers should notify the USDA area 

veterinarian or state veterinarian right away. What is avian influenza?
>> Avian influenza is a highly contagious, transmissible disease caused by 

a virus. The virus that causes the disease, different kinds of birds, and 

spread through secretions and droppings. People can catch the virus on 

hands, shoes, clothes and equipment. Also, remember that wild birds can 

be an important source of infection. The symptoms of avian influenza 

really vary. Depends on the virus strain and host species, so what kind of 

bird. Some strains produce mild respiratory symptoms such as coughing, 

ocular and nasal secretions, swelling of the nasal sinuses.

 That's a common sign in certain birds such as ducks and turkeys. On the 

other hand, some strains are very virulent and can cause high mortality, 

that can reach 100% in a few days. In some cases, chickens may die 

without showing symptoms. The bird is just found dead. In other cases, 

symptoms can include blue discoloration and swelling of the head, red 

discoloration of the shank, the lower leg and feet, and sometimes, blood 

stained ocular and nasal secretions, and diarrhea.

>> On the next slide we show the signs that infected birds can show. Can 

you talk about treating these birds?

>> Avian influenza is really not curable. There's no treatment, like other 

viral diseases in poultry. So there's no treatment for avian influenza.

>> Virulent Newcastle disease on the next slide is similar, isn't it?

>> Actually, it is. Newcastle disease infection, virulent strains can be 

similar, the signs, to avian influenza, and can spread from infected birds 

through secretions and feathers and droppings. People can move these 

germs on their hands, clothes and equipment.

>> Can you describe the signs of infection with virulent Newcastle? Can it 

be treated?

>> Again, Newcastle disease is not treatable. The symptoms vary 

depending on the strains. Some strains cause mild respiratory disease 

with mild symptoms. Other strains are very virulent, and can cause high 

mortality that can reach 100%. Symptoms include severe lethargy, 

decreased feed and water intake, sneezing, nasal secretions, coughing, 
gasping for air. Other symptoms, greenish diarrhea, and sometimes we 

see swelling around the eyes.

>> These are terrible for birds. Next, we have the signs, and three pictures 

that show a rooster and hen affected by virulent Newcastle disease.

>> The picture on the left shows two birds, lethargic, you can see 

discoloration of the comb, and the picture on the right, you can see 

secretions, discharge from the nostrils and mouth.

>> Now, we will focus on more common diseases. These are often found 

in backyard flocks in the United States and preventable with good 

biosecurity. These are respiratory diseases, Marek's disease, and 

coccidiosis. They're not the only infectious disease affecting chickens, but 

the most likely flocks are likely to see. The common respiratory diseases in 

chickens are based by bacteria and viruses. Mycoplasma infections are 

common, mycoplasma synoviae and mycoplasma gallisepticum. 

You will often see these abbreviated as MS and MG. Infectious coryza is 

another disease. ILT and IB are also, can be spread by infected birds, 

including wild birds, through droppings, body discharges, and feathers. 

Again, people can move the germs around on their hands, shoes, clothes, 

or dirty equipment. In the case of MG, the hen can spread it to chicks 

through the eggs. Tahseen, what are the signs the flocks are affected by 

one of these diseases?

>> The signs of respiratory disease are not specific. They're general and 

usually don't pinpoint to a certain disease. The most common symptoms in 

birds affected with respiratory disease are rasping breathing, secretions 

from the nostrils and eyes, ocular and nasal discharges, swelling of the 

eyelids, gasping for air. Difficulty breathing, the bird opens their mouth 

during breathing, sometimes, with changes in egg quality such as 

production of misshapen eggs, thin shells, and sometimes, egg without 

shells. These symptoms are general, and not specific for, all it can tell us is 

that the bird has respiratory disease. As far as the treatment, it depends on 

the causative agent. With viral diseases, there's no treatment, like other 

viral diseases in poultry. For bacterial diseases such as mycoplasma, the 
diseases can be treated with antibiotics, however, keep in mind that 

although the antibiotics may cure the disease, the birds look fine, no 

symptoms any more, but they can remain a carrier. The germs remain in 

the bird and the bird can shed the causative agent and can be a source of 

infection to other birds in the flock.

>> The next four slides show cases of each of those respiratory diseases. 

Tahseen, please describe the signs you see in each photo.

>> This is a turkey, you can see there's swelling of the face under the eye. 

And there's, swelling of the nasal sinus. In this case, the bird is infected 

with mycoplasma.

>> Next.

>> The other slide shows the same thing. You can see the swelling in the 

face, just under the eye. And this shows infection of the nasal sinus. In 

this case, it's caused by a bacteria. Next, this bird, stretching of the legs, 

and opening of the mouth. These symptoms indicate that the bird has 

difficulty breathing. That's why the bird twists the head and opens the 

mouth, trying to get air. In this case, the disease is infectious 

laryngotracheitis, a viral disease. These eggs are misshapen, not normal 

shaped. One of the eggs, the shell is cracked, broken. The reason is the 

shell is thin and can be broken easily. In this case, the eggs from a bird 

with infectious bronchitis, a viral disease and production of misshapen or 

thin shelled eggs, eggs without shells , or symptoms of infection with this 

virus.

>> A disease that is common in backyard poultry is Marek's disease. 

Chickens infected with this virus early in life but show no signs until they're 

older, they have usually been part of the flock for months or years. The 

virus is spread in the feather dust and can last in the environment for many 

months. People can also carry the virus around on their hands, clothes 

and shoes unless they clean up well after handling infected birds. 

Tahseen, what does this virus do to birds? Can it be cured?
>> Marek's disease is common for backyard chickens. As Julie 

mentioned, it's mainly a disease of chickens and infected chickens share 

the virus in the dander and can transmit it to other birds in the flock. There 

are different forms of this disease. But two forms are common. One form 

is characterized by the presence of tumors, like cancer, and the other form 

is characterized by damage to the nasal tissues in the body, including 

nerves, brain, and spinal cord. There are other forms, one is what we call 

the ocular form, with discoloration of the eye, that's not really common. As 

far as symptoms, chickens with advanced tumors, or cancer, become 

lethargic, lose weight, and die. 

The other form, can affect the nerves ands sometimes brain and spine 

cord -- common in backyard chickens. The symptoms start with limping, 

wobbling when walking, sometimes with a droopy wing, then gradually the 

symptoms progress to an inability to stand. The bird becomes paralyzed. 

Classic posture is one leg forward, and the other leg, backward. But this is 

really not always the case. This posture has been described, you can see 

the picture, in textbooks, but really you don't always see this. Sometimes 

the bird is totally paralyzed, cannot stand. Other symptoms is twisting of 

the neck, but this, again, sometimes, not always the case.

>> How can this be treated?

>> Marek's disease, no treatment because it's viral.

>> Bad one. Mike, you don't usually recommend vaccinations for 

backyard birds except for Marek's disease?

>> Correct. Most of the vaccinations out there for poultry, for a lot of 

diseases we talked about previously, are not really necessary in backyard 

birds. Unless you have something like a specific history in the flock, maybe 

you should vaccinate, or some other specific environmental factor. But with 

Marek's disease, all backyard birds should get the vaccine. It's challenging 

in order to get an effective vaccination for Marek's disease. The best type 

of vaccine requires specific storage, liquid nitrogen, so it's not cost 

effective. There are vaccines that can be stored at room temperature, not 

the best but definitely better than doing nothing. With the vaccine, also, it's 
challenging, you must get the vaccine in the birds within 4 hours after the 

birds hatch. Any later than that, the vaccine is most likely not doing any 

good, whatsoever. If you try to vaccinate all the birds in one clutch, and the 

vaccine is only good for a couple hours after being mixed, it's best to work 

with a veterinarian. 

Along those lines, a lot of the things we have been talking about, really 

would be beneficial to have a very good relationship with your veterinarian, 

that's going to work with your poultry flock. You talked about your 

biosecurity plan. The veterinarians can be very helpful building the plan 

that is right for you. We talk about how to recognize a disease getting in 

the flocks. That's what veterinarians are trained to do, recognize disease. 

We talked about a lot of the diseases looking similar to each other. 

Veterinarians can help you determine what disease your bird has and 

beyond that, do you want to treat, not treat, what will you use? Again, a 

key factor that veterinarians can help you with. 

If you try to treat yourself and don't know what the birds have, you can do 

more harm than good, developing disease resistant bugs, in the 

environment. So a good strong veterinary relationship is critical if you're 

owning backyard birds. Another thing, with Marek's disease, if you're 

looking online, and trying to research up on Marek's disease there might be 

online sites that talk about the disease being in birds from about four to 16

weeks of age. With backyard birds, that's definitely not the case. There 

are many, many cases of Marek's disease, in backyard chickens, for six 

months, a year, more than a year, so don't be fooled by that, if you see it.

>> Next, we will talk about coccidiosis, another extremely common disease 

of backyard poultry. It's caused by a parasite in the intestinal tract. 

Coccidiosis is spread thorough the droppings of infected birds, and they 

can easily contaminate equipment like transport cages and people can 

easily become contaminated on clothes and shoes and we can carry it from 

place to place without knowing it. Tahseen, how would a care taker know 

birds have coccidiosis? And what should they do?
>> Let me say something about coccidiosis, first. Coccidiosis is a disease 

of the intestinal tract caused by a parasite, and there are different kinds of 

this parasite that infect different areas of the intestinal tract. Infected birds 

share in the droppings, and other birds ingest, from the environment. The 

eggs of the parasite need damp areas to become effective, to other birds in 

the flock. So wet area, for example, around the drinkers, are really a 

paradise for this parasite. The eggs of the parasite need to develop and 

need damp areas. As far as symptoms, they're not specific, depending on 

the type of parasite, which part of the intestine is affected, and also the 

severity of the infections. With mild cases, you may not see much. But with 

severe infections you can see anorexia, bloody droppings, lethargy, and 

there can be heavy death loss. So coccidiosis should not be 

underestimated. It can cause heavy loss in the flock. The disease is 

preventable and treatable. The disease can be prevented, there are 

medications that can be preventive and medications that can treat the 

disease. Your veterinarian can prescribe medications for the flock and I 

emphasize that keeping the floor dry, especially around the drinkers, is 

very important to minimize the spread of the infection.

>> Now we will change the topic to talk about protecting human health 

through biosecurity. Fortunately, people and poultry don't share many 

diseases, but there are a few infections people can get from close contact 

with live poultry. We have been talking about germs that make poultry sick. 

But salmonellosis can be transmitted from healthy looking poultry to 

people. Because it's an important illness for people who keep poultry, we 

will detail the disease and how to prevent it. Worth mentioning, though less 

common than avian influenza, psittacosis is transmitted from birds to 

people. Certain strains of avian influenza have been transmitted from birds 

to people. Tahseen, tell us about salmonellosis.

>> Salmonellosis is a bacterial disease caused by a bacteria, that's 

common. Wild birds can be infected, and other farm animals, rodents, all 

these are important source of infection of your flocks with salmonellosis. 

One thing to remember, in backyard poultry, infected with this, it's usually 

silent, meaning the birds carry it in their intestines but show no symptoms. 

This bird sheds in the droppings and can be a source of infection to 
humans. Contamination of hands from handling infected birds or working 

in poultry premises can spread it to humans. The bird can carry it, with no 

symptoms, but they shed in the droppings and when you handle the birds 

or work in the premises, you may carry this and can cause infection. 

Children, elderly people, people are weak immune systems, are especially 

susceptible to illness from this. As far as prevention, one step you can 

take, wash your hands after handling birds, and after working in the 

premises of backyard chickens. We tell people there's one thing you can 

do to prevent salmonellosis. Wash your hands, wash your hands, wash 

your hands.

>> Thank you. Next slide, we have, people can have mild cases or severe 

cases of diarrhea.

>> Actually, for humans, the disease with be serious. Especially in young 

people and children. And people with weak immune systems and elderly 

people. It's very important to be careful when you handle birds, when you 

work with these backyard chickens, extremely important that you wash your 

hands with soap and warm water to prevent infection.

>> It seems hard to keep kids from picking up those cute chicks to, kiss

them but it's truly important, make sure could wash up and don't snuggle to 

closely. Next, we talk about an outbreak of salmonellosis that occurred, 

associated with pet poultry in the United States. Mike, can you describe 

them?

>> Like what Julie and Tahseen talked about, take the pieces of the 

puzzle, and that's what creates an outbreak. A situation, there's a common 

source of birds that may have been exposed to it, show no signs, and next 

thing, people, elderly people, maybe not washing hands properly, then you 

can end up with something that looks like this. It's a map from the CDC 

showing the most recent outbreak in 2019. 

You can see the number of cases in each state. This is a large outbreak. 

On the next slide, according to CDC, this was the largest number of people 

in a given year to become sick from salmonella. Year after year we try get 

out information how to prevent the disease, getting sick from birds that 
silently carry it, yet year after year there's a large number of cases. In this 

case, the largest number we ever had. Very important to remain very 

aware, conscientious that, these healthy birds can or disease that's can 

make you sick.

>> We just covered many ways things can go wrong, but all the diseases 

can the prevented through biosecurity and managing a flock well by 

keeping the birds comfortable. We will provide tips on simple measures 

that anyone can use, to keep birds healthy. A collection of good habits that 

you follow every day, every time you take care of your flock. It's not 

possible to completely eliminate all the risks to a backyard flock but you 

can significantly reduce the major risks and sources of germs to be 

successful and practical, biosecurity habits should focus on the big risks. 

Mike what are the big risks? And the steps that small flock keepers it use?

>> Julie, here's a listing of some of the most common risk things that we 

would consider. Introduction of new birds into an existing flock is a big risk. 

Wild birds present a risk, basic cleaning and disinfection if things get really 

dirty, visitors that own poultry themselves can be a problem. Rodents, 

insects, also, and a stressful environment. For each point, we will talk 

about them in some depth. Next, new poultry coming into the environment 

and contact with existing flock. First of all, if you don't have to do this, just 

don't bring new birds into an existing flock. This is probably the number 

one reason I see disease breaks that occur in backyard poultry, someone 

bringing in birds this think about healthy, to existing birds and suddenly 

everyone gets sick. If you're going to be doing it, I'd use sources from birds 

that you have some information about, as far as their disease status.

 Flocks that participate in the national improvement plan could be a good 

source because at least there are some information coming from them. 

The worst places are things like auctions, swaps, county and state fairs, 

areas where you have a lot of birds from a lot of environments that are 

unknown, all coming together, potentially sharing diseases and you bring 

one back to yours as they can contaminant your flock. If you're bringing 

birds, I highly recommend you use a quarantine procedure. 
This doesn't mean separating just the two groups by chicken wire. It 

means actually, a physical separation where your old birds are in one area 

and new birds in a completely separate area. This quarantine should be 

without any medications, going into the new birds, and then, also you want 

to have at least the separation for at least thirty days, period of time. 

You're making sure the new birds are not showing signs after being 

stressed in a new environment. Next slide, wild birds, if you set up an 

environment where your poultry are kept that, wild birds will naturally go to, 

it be a problem. Set up your coup away from ponds, where wild water fowl 

might be coming in, can be helpful. Spilled feed will attract wild birds, too. 

So keep things clean, covered up and hopefully only accessible to your 

poultry. People can use decoys to keep wild burdens away. But they 

quickly figure out things, if you don't change it up. I recommend that every 

day or two, you move your scarecrow, changing the clothing on it, putting a 

hat on, even if it's just a fake owl, moving it around will help keep the birds 

away. Next, cleaning and disinfection. 

Remember, if you use disinfectant, it typically won't work with organic 

material. So anything like poop, feathers, stuff, really need to be cleaned 

up before you put your disinfectant on. The waters here, you can see the 

water is green. It should never be green. It's a sure sign that these waters 

need to be cleaned more frequently. Your clothing, equipment, especially if 

birds are in quarantine, definitely, disinfect, and regularly wash your hands. 

Visitors. Often, people like to relate to other people who own backyard 

poultry. We like to share our coup design, but this can be risky. Your 

friend might have a disease they can accidentally bring, or vice versa. So, 

if you can avoid visitors that, that's the best thing but if you have visitors, 

make sure they have a really good idea about biosecurity, clean shoes, 

clothes, and shower after going back and forth between the two flocks. 

Next slide, we will talk about insects and rodents. A lot of things we talked 

about with wild birds, the same type of stuff here with rodent activity. 

Keeping things clean, keeping things like easy feeding and watering areas 

for rodents, is a good idea. Mitigate against the rodents want to coming get 

rid of hiding spots, tall grass, rodents like to make nests and hide out. So 

keeping a tidy environment around your coup, that goes a long way to 
prevent from rodents and insects. If you have problems, you can use traps 

and bait station, but they must be maintained properly. This station has no 

bait at all. It's filled with debris that's not helpful and can be bedding 

material for rodents. I've opened up a bait station and found a family of 

baby mice living in the bait station. That's not a well maintained station. 

That's doing more harm than good, so be smart. Maintain them properly. 

With that, I will pass it pack to Julie.

>> These are tips anybody can use. I'd like to share steps I use. Not only 

introducing germs, but spreading disease within the flock. I also 

recommend quarantine for new birds. I use the 30-30 rule. Keep the 

quarantined birds 30 feet away from other birds, and for 30 days, at least. 

Many backyard flocks have not only chickens, but other types of poultry. 

Often, birds of different ages, from baby to adult birds, it's good to keep 

your types and ages of poultry separate, like separated pens for chickens 

and ducks, and keep the babies separated from the adults, especially 

important for preventing Marek's disease from spreading. I start my route 

from the youngest to oldest, starting with the babies in the brooder. Finally, 

I leave quarantined birds until last and take care of sick birds after 

everyone else so I can't track disease throughout the flock. Then, I go 

back, I do not go back to the flock until I have showered and put on clean 

clothes. Comfortable birds are more likely to be able to fend off disease 

than stressed birds. Birds are comfortable when they live low stress lives, 

good food, clean water, not constantly worried about predators, and have a 

safe, darkened place to sleep at night. If something should get through 

your good care and defenses, and you see signs of illness, there are 

places to go for help. Tahseen, your laboratory is an important resource. 

What are the options for getting help for sick chickens?

>> I want to mention one thing. If you start to have death losses in your 

flock, don't wait. Very important to get diagnosis, early diagnosis will 

minimize the death losses, and some diseases are treatable. So when you 

start to lose one bird, then another tomorrow, please don't wait until you 

lose 50% of the flock. Act quickly. There are several options to get a 

correct diagnosis. You may contact an experienced veterinarian, and 

contact the veterinarian diagnostic lab in your state, which usually can do 
additional laboratory testing to confirm the diagnosis of disease and we 

mentioned that often, symptoms are similar, not specific, so additional 

laboratory tests are really important to confirm the diagnosis of certain 

diseases and the laboratory in your state can do that for you. When you 

have high mortality, if it's alarming, especially within a short period of time, 

very important to tell the authorities in the state, state veterinarians, about 

this. This could be a contagious disease. The earlier we have, the more 

likely we can stop it from spreading. Other options, contact county or 

university services, they can also help you with that.

>> Thank you, Dr. Martin and Dr. Aziz. I will conclude by -- APHIS 

developed a library of check lists with recommendations. We encourage 

you to visit the website to view and download these materials. All the 

check lists are available in multiple languages, including Spanish, Tagalog, 

Vietnamese. We encourage you to visit the Defend Your Flock website, to 

find lots of other free tools, including recordings of prior webinars, and other 

resources. APHIS created social media content to help promote 

biosecurity. They're available in English and Spanish, we hope you will 

share these on Facebook and other social media channels to be sure 

everyone is using biosecurity every day, every time. 

No matter what the size of your flock. Be sure to check out more helpful 

information on our social media channel. This presentation along with 

answers to your questions will be available for download from the Defend 

Your Flock website, shortly. Be sure to follow Defend Your Flock on 

Facebook and Twitter to be notified when the presentation is available. 

Use the hashtag, Defend Your Flock, when sharing or posting information 

to help spread the word. On behalf of APHIS, thank you, Dr. Martin, and 

Dr. Aziz, for sharing your valuable insights and knowledge today. Let's 

keep our poultry healthy together.